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tices. "If I were to make peace with every and letting loose their cruisers to prey upon Enbody," said the semi-barbarian, "what should I glish commerce, they gave them full permisdo with my corsairs? What should I do with sion to depredate upon ours. These depredamy soldiers? They would take off my head for tions were very extensive in the West Indies; want of other prizes, not being able to live upon and the French cruisers finally became so bold their miserable allowance." that they captured American vessels in our own These were grave questions and cogent rea-waters. These events awakened our Governsons in the mind of the Dey, but failed to enlistment to the importance of creating a navy. the sympathies of Colonel Humphreys, our commissioner, who wrote, at the close of 1793, "If we mean to have a commerce we must have a navy to defend it."

These words formed the text of a message from Washington to Congress in the spring of 1794. That body immediately authorized the construction or purchase of six frigates or an equivalent naval force, and appropriated $700,000 for the purpose. As the law had special reference to the quarrel with Algiers, it contained a clause directing all proceedings under it to cease in the event of an adjustment of the difficulties.

The keels of six frigates were speedily laid, and naval commanders appointed; but the United States Government, in the absence of a naval force, was compelled to make a humiliating treaty with the pirate for the sake of commerce and humanity, and the work was suspended. This was an unwise measure, for the tribute and ransom money paid to the Dey was more than equal to the cost of the six frigates, which might have sealed up his ports by blockade and brought him to terms.*

The United States Government was soon convinced of its error in not completing the frigates. British cruisers, knowing our weakness on the ocean, commenced the practice of taking seamen from American merchant vessels and impressing them into the naval service of Great Britain. The French Government, then in the hands of the revolutionists, also began to exhibit an unfriendly feeling toward the United States, because they maintained a strict neutrality respecting the wars of France with other nations, and because, feeling their own strength, they no longer leaned for support upon their old ally. The French authorities determined to punish the Americans for their independence:

Three of the six frigates-the United States, the Constellation, and the Constitution-were speedily completed, and by mid-summer, 1798, twentyfour armed vessels (none of them to exceed twenty-two guns), and several galleys and other craft, were ordered by Congress for the protection of our commerce, which in five years had greatly expanded. The exports in that time had increased from nineteen millions of dollars to more than fifty-six millions, and the imports in about the same ratio.

The establishment of an armed marine made a new cabinet officer necessary, and Benjamin Stoddart, of Georgetown, in the District of Columbia, was appointed Secretary of the Navy. Ample duties awaited his installation. War with France seemed inevitable; and in July, 1798, Congress authorized American cruisers to capture French vessels of war, and gave the President power to commission privateers. This was the beginning of the present navy of the United States.

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RICHARD DALE.

The first ship of war sent to sea after the establishment of the National Government was the Ganges, Captain Richard Dale.* She went

⚫ Between the years 1785 and 1793, the Algerine pirates had captured and carried into Algiers 15 Amèrican vessels, used the property, and made one hundred and eighty officers and seamen slaves of the most revolting kind. In 1795, the United States agreed, by treaty, to pay eight hundred thousand dollars for captives then alive, and in addition to make the Dey or governor a present of a frigate worth a hundred thousand dollars. An annual tribute of twenty-three thousand was also to be paid. The redemption of captives by a similar tribute had long been Richard Dale was a native of Virginia, and was born the custom of European nations. The frigate sent to the in 1756. He went to sea at the age of twelve years, and Dey was called the Crescent. An idea of the utter help-in 1776 became a Lieutenant of a Virginia cruiser. He lessness of the Government without a navy, and the ab- was with Captain Wickes in his cruise among the British ject tone of public sentiment in the presence of such an Islands in 1777, and being captured, suffered a long imevil as Algerine piracy, may be gathered from the fact prisonment in England. He was with Paul Jones in the that the public press spoke thus of the sailing of the Cres- fight with the Serapis, and received the thanks of Concent for the Mediterranean. "Our best wishes follow Cap-gress for his gallantry. He returned to the merchant tain Newman, his officers, and men. May they arrive in safety at the place of their destination, and present to the Dey of Algiers one of the finest specimens of elegant naval architecture which was ever borne on the Picataqua's waters.

"Blow all ye winds that fill the prosperous sail,
And hushed in peace be every adverse gale."

service at the close of the war, and was a successful adventurer in the East India trade. He was fourth in rank of the six captains appointed in 1794, and was commissioned a Commodore in 1801. His squadron did good service in the Mediterranean. He left the navy in 1802, and died at Philadelphia in 1826.

out toward the close of May, 1798, to cruise | Captain Truxtun. On the 9th of February,
from the coast of Connecticut to the capes of when near the island of Nevis, he discovered a
Virginia. The next vessels set afloat were the large ship, and bore down upon her. She proved
Constellation, Captain Truxtun, and the Dela- to be L'Insurgente, the finest vessel in the French
care, Captain Decatur. They sailed early in navy, and carrying forty-eight guns, and over
June to cruise as far as the coast of Florida. four hundred men. After a chase of three hours
Decatur soon captured the French privateer Le the Constellation came alongside of the enemy,
Croyable and sent her into the Delaware, where and opened a destructive fire upon L'Insurgente.
she was put in commission as an American Both ships kept up a fierce cannonade for over
vessel, was named Retaliation, and was placed an hour, when the Constellation shot out of the
in charge of Lieutenant Bainbridge. Le Croy- smoke, wore round, hauled athwart her antago-
able was the first trophy of victory secured by nist's stern, and prepared to deliver a raking
the navy of the United States.
fire. At that moment L'Insurgente struck her
colors, and the contest ended. This first im-
portant victory achieved by the navy produced
great joy throughout the United States. Lieu-
tenants Rodgers and Porter, both of them com-
modores in the American Navy afterward, were
with Truxtun on this occasion, and shared in
the honors.

The United States was completed in July the same year, and sailed in command of Captain Barry, whose fourth lieutenant was the now (October, 1861) venerable Commodore Stewart, or "Old Ironsides" as he is familiarly called. The Constitution (yet in the service) was also sent to sea the same month, under Captain Nicholson. Among his officers was the afterward distinguished Commodore Preble. At the close of the year most of the United States cruisers were in the West Indies and vicinity, much to the surprise of both the British and French commanders.

The Retaliation was an unfortunate vessel for both parties, for in November, 1798, she was recaptured by the French ships Volontaire and L'Insurgente, and carried into Guadaloupe.

War between the United States and France was still impending at the opening of the year 1799, and the Government of the former was very active in strengthening the navy-so active that no less than twenty-eight vessels, with an aggregate of 666 guns were set afloat. A large number of these were cruising in the West Indies. Among them was the Constellation, 38,

John Barry was born in Ireland in 1745, and emigrated to America at the age of 14 years. He had been on the sea for some time, and here pursued his vocation. He entered the naval service of Congress in 1776, and was active throughout the war. He was in the command of the United States frigate at the time of his death, which occurred at Philadelphia in September, 1803.

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A year later, Truxtun, still in command of the Constellation, had another contest with a French man-of-war. On the morning of the 1st of February, 1800, while cruising off the island of Guadaloupe, he discovered a large ship which he took to be an English merchantman. He hoisted British colors to entice her to come near, but she bore away and he gave chase. He soon discovered that she was a large French vessel mounting not less than fifty-four guns. He determined to attack her, notwithstanding the disparity in strength. She was a good sailer, and the chase continued until eight o'clock in the evening of the 2d. Truxtun was then within hailing distance. He ordered his ensign to be hoisted, his battle-lanterns to be lighted, and his trumpet to be brought. At that moment she opened a fire from her stern and quarter guns upon the Constellation. A few minutes afterward the latter opened her fire; and for five hours the combatants fought desperately in the gloom of night. At one o'clock in the morning of the 3d of February Truxtun's antagonist became silent, but the Constellation was so much injured that she could not secure the prize.

,attacks and vanquishes the French &

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COMMODORE TRUXTUN'S MEDAL

The latter escaped and sailed for Curaçoa, while the Constellation sailed for Jamaica for repairs. Both parties were ignorant of the name of each other's vessel, but it was subsequently ascertained that the French ship was La Vengeance, manned with four hundred men including passengers, among whom was the Governor of Guadaloupe and his family, and two general officers. She would have been a rich prize, for she had a full cargo of coffee and sugar, and a large amount of specie. She had lost fifty killed and one hundred and ten wounded. The Constellation lost fourteen killed and twenty-five wounded. The Congress of the United States voted thanks and a gold medal to Commodore Truxtun for his gallantry on that occasion.*

become my slaves, and therefore I have a right to order you as I think proper." Bainbridge was obliged to comply, for the castle guns of the pirate governor would not let him leave the harbcr. He sailed for the Orient, and had the honor of first displaying the American flag over the waters of the Golden Horn, and before the minarets of ancient Estamboul. The Sultan regarded it as a favorable omen of future friendship be tween the two nations because his flag bore the device of a crescent moon, and the American a group of stars.

The

The insolence of the Barbary powers at length became unbearable. The Bashaw of Tunis demanded tribute, and informed the American consul that if a present in money was not received from the United States within six months, he would declare war. He kept his word, and in May, 1801, the flag-staff of the American consulate was cut down and war proclaimed. United States expected the event, and had already fitted out a squadron for the Mediterranean, under Captain Dale, whose flag-ship was the President. He anchored off Gibraltar on the 1st of July, and soon afterward the President appeared at Algiers and Tunis, to the great surprise of the respective governors. Meanwhile her consort, the Enterprise, 12, Lieutenant Sterrett, fell in with a Tripolitan ship named Tripoli, ran alongside of her, and commenced an engagement within pistol-shot distance which lasted for three hours. During that time the Tripoli struck her colors three times, and as often renewed the

Napoleon Bonaparte, with the title of First Consul, succeeded the weak Directory in the Government of France. War between America and that country was averted by his wisdom and justice, and peace was secured by a treaty made early in the autumn of 1800. With a strange misconception of the public good, the Government ordered a diminution of the navy to twelve frigates, only six of these to be kept in actual service. The President was also empowered to discharge from service a great proportion of the naval officers; and that strong arm of the Government which had so protected commerce as to enable the people to sell to foreign countries, during the difficulties with France, surplus products to the amount of two hundred millions of dollars, and to import sufficient to yield the Government a revenue exceeding twenty-three mill-contest. ions of dollars, was almost paralyzed by an unwise economy in public expenditure. The folly of this measure was soon made apparent by events connected with the Mediterranean corsairs.

Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli, known collectively as the Barbary States, were now engaged in piratical depredations on the commerce of the world. Their insolence was remarkable, considering their real insignificance compared with the powers that submitted to their insults. The conduct of the Dey of Algiers toward Captain Bainbridge, in the spring of 1800, may be cited as a fair specimen of that insolence. Bainbridge arrived at Algiers in the Washington, with the annual tribute of the United States. When that errand was accomplished, the Dey demanded the use of the Washington to convey an embassador and presents to the Sultan at Constantinople. Bainbridge remonstrated, when the Dey haughtily observed, "You pay me tribute, by which you

• Thomas Truxtun was born on Long Island, New York, in 1755. He was in command of a privateer as early as 1775, and distinguished himself in that service during the Revolution. At the close of the war he engaged in commerce, and in 1794 was one of the six naval Commanders appointed by Washington. At the close of the war with France he was ordered to the Mediterranean, but in consequence of some misunderstanding with the Government, he left the navy. For many years he followed the pursuits of agriculture in New Jersey, and then went to live in Philadelphia, where he became high sheriff in 1816. He died in May, 1822.

This treachery exasperated Sterrett,

and he gave orders to sink the corsair. For a
few minutes the combat was fearful, when Mo-
hammed Sous, the corsair's commander, cried
for mercy, threw his flag overboard, and making
a profound salam in the waist of his ship, begged
for quarter. The Tripoli was a wreck, and had
lost, in killed, and wounded, twenty of her men.
No one was injured on the Enterprise. When
the unfortunate commander of the Tripoli re-
turned to his port, wounded and weak, the en-
raged governor ordered him to be paraded through
the streets on a jackass, and then bastinadoed.
| The Philadelphia cruised a while in the Mediter-
ranean, exercising a wholesome restraint on the
pirates, and the Essex, of the same squadron,
guarded the straits between the Pillars of Her-
cules.

Another expedition was sent to the Mediterranean, under Commodore Morris, in 1802. But very little of great importance was done by the navy in that quarter until 1804, when Tripoli was bombarded. Commodore Preble had been sent thither to humble the pirates the previous year. After bringing the belligerent Emperor of Morocco to terms, he appeared before Tripoli With his squadron. The Philadelphia, commanded by Bainbridge, struck on a rock in the harbor, and before she could be extricated, was captured by the Tripolitans. This occurred at the close of October, 1803. The officers were treated as prisoners of war, but the crew were made slaves. She was relieved, put in order,

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miles from Tripoli. The Bashaw still held out, demanding five hundred dollars apiece for Bainbridge's crew.

On the 29th of August the Americans again opened upon the town. The contest commenced at three o'clock in the morning, and raged furiously until daylight. The Constitution, Preble's flagship, then ran in to within a short distance of the castle and batteries, pouring in destructive discharges of round and. grape shot. She silenced the guns of the castle, and spread destruction among the gun-boats and other vessels. The squadron finally withdrew, after doing great injury to the town.

Another attack on Tripoli was made on the 3d of September with similar results. The conflict lasted an hour and a quarter, when the attacking squadron withdrew. On the night of the 4th an attempt was made to destroy the enemy's cruisers in the harbor by exploding a floating mine among them. The ketch Intrepid, used by Decatur when he burned the Philadelphia, was converted into an "infernal," and taken into the harbor

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row-boats. She exploded before reaching her destination, and not one of the gallant men who manned her was ever heard of afterward.

and moored near the castle. Lieutenant De- | in intense darkness. Her crew were to escape in
catur, son of Captain Decatur of the Delaware,
resolved to wipe out the disgrace by capturing or
destroying the Philadelphia. With seventy-six
volunteers he sailed into the harbor of Tripoli on
the evening of the 3d of February, 1804, ran
alongside the Philadelphia under the guns of the
castle, boarded her, killed or drove into the sea
all of her turbaned defenders, set her on fire,
and under cover of a heavy cannonade from the
American squadron, escaped without losing a
man. This bold act greatly alarmed the Ba-
shaw, and he became exceedingly circumspect.

At the close of July, 1804, Commodore Preble* appeared off Tripoli with his squadron, and at nearly three o'clock in the afternoon of the 3d of August he attacked the town at grape-shot distance. The fight with gun-boats was a desperate one; while the cannonade and bombardment, spiritedly answered by the Tripolitans, was unceasing. After a contest of nearly two hours, during which time the town suffered a severe loss of life and property from the explosion of shells, the American squadron withdrew, having been but slightly damaged.

On the afternoon of the 7th of August the bombardment of Tripoli was renewed, and continned three hours. In this affair the American vessels suffered severely. A hot shot passed through the magazine of one of the gun-boats, and she blew up, killing her commander and eight men. The squadron withdrew about six Edward Preble was born in Portland, Maine, in August, 1761. He became a midshipman in 1779. He was promoted to Lieutenant, and in 1798 and 1799 he made two cruises as commander. With a captain's commission he sailed in the Essex in 1800. For his gallant conduct in the attack on Tripoli, Congress gave him thanks and an elegant gold medal. He was greatly beloved by his officers and men. He died in August, 1807.

By these several attacks by the squadron of Preble the Bashaw of Tunis was greatly alarmed and injured, but was not humbled. The following year a land-force struck him in the rear, and the terrified ruler hastened to make a treaty of peace with the Americans, but not upon terms which the latter ought to have demanded. No more tribute was to be paid, but the Americans were compelled to give sixty thousand dollars ransom money for their brethren in captivity. Thus terminated the war with Tripoli; and soon afterward the Bey of Tunis, who affected contempt for the Americans, and talked loudly about declaring war against them, was so humbled by Commodore Rodgers that he eagerly sought peace, and expressed a desire to send a minister to the United States. The old order of things on the Southern coast of the Mediterranean Sea was now much reversed. This result had been brought about wholly by the operations of the gallant little navy of the United States.*

At about this time the distinguished Robert Fulton proposed to introduce a new element into

⚫ Officers of the navy erected a monument in the Navyyard at Washington in commemoration of their brother officers who fell in the war with Tripoli. It was mutilated by the British when they burned Washington City in 1814. It was afterward removed to the west front of the Capitol, but has been taken away, and set up at Annap lis. It is of white marble, about forty feet in height. On the column are bows of vessels. At the base are four marble emblematical figures-Mercury, Fame, History, and America. The column is surmounted by an eagle. On one side of the base, in relief, is Tripoli; on the others the names of the officers,

NAVAL MONUMENT AT ANNAPOLIS.

the system of naval warfare. It was that of floating mines, which he called "torpedoes," intended to destroy ships of largest dimensions by exploding them under their bottoms. He offered the "infernal machine" to the British Government, and exhibited successful experiments before members of the Board of Admiralty; but the Government declined it. He came home and offered the invention to the United States Government. He exhibited successful experiments in the harbor of New York, when quite a large vessel was broken up and destroyed by one of his torpedoes. Our Government also refused to use the destructive machine; but when the war broke out in 1812 they were tried on private account. The British vessels greatly feared them; and it is believed that the dread of Fulton's presence, with his torpedoes, prevented them entering many of our harbors and destroying the towns during the Fulton's grand idea was confessedly the philanthropic one of producing what

war.

he called "the liberty of the seas," by making naval warfare so terribly destructive, by means of his submarine mines, that it would fall into desuetude.

The amicable relations which had existed between the United States and Great Britain since Jay's treaty in 1795, were now disturbed by the progress of events in Europe. Bonaparte had passed from the seat of First Consul to the throne as Emperor of France. He had also been proclaimed King of Italy, and his brothers were made rul

ing sovereigns. He was

in the full tide of success, and flushed with the excitement of conquests. A large part of Continental Europe lay prostrate at his feet, and trembled in his presence. England had almost destroyed the French power at sea, yet she, too, turned pale at the sight of his legions and the amazing potency of his name. But the United States, still following the policy of Washington in maintaining a strict neutrality, neither coveted his favors nor feared his power. the same time American shipping being allowed free intercourse between English and French ports, enjoyed the vast advantages of a profitable carrying trade between them.

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EFFECT OF A "TORPEDO."

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